WANDERERS have no choice but to produce an instant reply to Saturday’s dismal derby defeat against Preston North End, says Mark Beevers.

After giving his side a half-time lead with his first goal of the season, the big defender could not prevent the play-off chasing visitors running away with the game.

The Whites now have successive away games in four days against Reading and Sheffield Wednesday – two teams still in the thick of the relegation race – so Beevers reckons there is no time to dwell on what went wrong at the Macron.

“There is no excuse for that performance in the second half,” he told The Bolton News. “Now we have to be mentally strong enough to come back straight away.

“I don’t think we can be too hard on ourselves because we’d lost one game in about 12 or 13 at home before that, it was a hell of a run, but it’s about how we react at Reading on Tuesday night and at Sheffield Wednesday on Saturday now.”

Wanderers have won just once on the road in the league this season – at Sheffield United in December – but produced a battling defensive performance to earn a draw on their last road trip at Norwich City.

Beevers admits a win may be required in one or both of the upcoming games if Phil Parkinson’s side are to stay out of trouble.

“Wins are paramount now, we can’t hide away from it,” he said.

“Our away form hasn’t been fantastic so far but we got a great draw at Norwich and over the festive period we proved we can get results too. We need to do that again now and show we can add points on the road.

“I think we have got enough in our squad to go down to Reading and get a result.”

Beevers was pleased, however, to get on the scoresheet for the first time.

“It was good to get off the mark,” he said. “As a player once you’ve scored one you feel like you can score every week so it would be good to start scoring goals now to help pull us away from that relegation zone.

“As defenders we have worked hard on set pieces. It’s good to see one come off.”